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Have you noticed The Record is running what sound like restaurant reviews on the Better Living front on Wednesdays? Star ratings aren't given, as they were in the Friday restaurant reviews that ended in November 2016 with the departure of critic Elisa Ung, several months after the newspaper was sold to Gannett Co. And prices don't always appear. Nor are readers assured The Record paid for the reviewer's meals.

On Dec. 12 (last Wednesday), Food Editor Esther Davidowitz panned The Hill, a highly anticipated seafood restaurant that opened in Closter after many months of delay. The headline said the restaurant "doesn't quite wow." Davidowitz said she visited four times, and "each time left disappointed and perplexed." Four times? She mentions only 7 appetizers and entrees in her appraisal. Did she go alone? She says, "I have eaten chef Ben Pollinger's food at Oceana, that seafood mecca in Manhattan where the Oradell resident worked for many years, and can vouch for his terrific cooking skills. Perhaps my expectations were too high."

On Dec. 5, Davidowitz appraised Vanillamore, a dessert lounge and restaurant in Montclair that would be avoided like the plague by anyone watching their cholesterol and sugar intake, as are many older readers of The Record. She praises "delightfully innovative, extraordinarily stylized desserts" and "beautifully plated savory dishes."

On Nov. 21, Davidowtitz reviewed yet another Montclair restaurant, even though the town isn't in Bergen County, once the heart of The Record's readership. She says the kitchen of the Montclair Social Club "sends out some of the best food my dining companions and I had eaten in North Jersey in some time." Again, there is no star rating or assurance The Record paid for the meals.

This was fun, sitting in my living room and taking pictures of huge steel beams flying over the 389 Main St project - sometimes 3 at a time - courtesy of the massive 110-ton crane and then seeing the workers become beam-walkers. The fifth shot looks like a DWI test.

12-12-18 (10-20)

But what I really wanted to shoot was the flying beams from on-site and on the sun side, so I did that on this day right after shooting brick walls being knocked down just up the street at the Holman's/435 Main Site. It was like when I used to shoot heavy metal shows 30 years ago - lots of noise, lots of "danger".

Every once in a while, I like to try to see if I still have my concert timing. I noticed (next-to-last shot) that the worker was catching something small thrown from below multiple times. In the last shot, I zoomed in and you can see exactly what it was.

Yes irons35, and there were two incidents in Hackensack within the past 20 years in which buildings being demolished fell unexpectedly. One was on Newman Street and Atlantic, the demolition to prepare for the parking tower. They were demolishing one end of the building and they didn't have the sidewalk blocked off at the other end, along Newman Street. The west end of the building then collapsed onto Newman Street, and could have killed people if they were walking there. The other was during the construction of the Ice Quad. The plan was to take off the roof and leave the 4 walls, and then rebuild from there to create the Ice Quad. High winds caused at least one of the 4 walls to completely collapse.

I would hope they completely vacated the store during the entire time that any structural members were being demolished higher than the height of the store. There was an incident in Philadelphia in 2012 where 7 people were killed because a contractor did not empty the adjoining structure, and the wall went thru the roof...

I wondered about that too, because the Family Dollar cashier is in that nearest corner, but subsequent photos from my roof showed no bricks or other debris on the Familly Dollar roof. There was a cop stationed at Main and Maple, so maybe he cleared them from that corner at that moment................or............maybe not.

I notice something on the city's promotion of the project that will infuriate the future tenants of this complex. And that is: "Amenity Space that may be converted to retail". I can tell you from being a tenant leader in Newark for 10 years that this is WAY BEYOND extremely objectionable. The builder is going to have some kind of temporary amenity, perhaps a fitness center or an oversized luxurious lobby, in order to lure in all the tenants at high rent, and then as soon as the building is filled and they have great rent roll coming in, they are going to screw the tenants and remove that amenity that they treasure. And then the tenants don't get a rent reduction for the loss. It's really VERY obnoxious and objectionable for a builder to do this. The city Zoning and Planning Boards should never allow or encourage that, and in fact, the reverse should be true. Approvals for construction should REQUIRE that amenities remain. And if a builder provides security guards in the lobby, they should be required to keep them. The most tremendous tenant movement in Newark all started with amenity reduction, and it culminated with the city council being pressured to adopt the strongest rent control ordinance in the United States.